


The Time Travel Paradox and the Curious Case of Grace

by Gmni76



Category: Terminator (Movies), Terminator - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, One Shot, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-03 01:00:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24046288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gmni76/pseuds/Gmni76
Summary: Dani Ramos contemplates how her future intersects with Grace's.  She thinks about the parallels between herself and a younger Sarah Connor.
Relationships: Grace Harper/Dani Ramos
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24





	The Time Travel Paradox and the Curious Case of Grace

Grace and Dani's relationship exists in two separate timelines. It’s hard to say which timeline they actually began in. Dani always likened the conundrum to the “chicken or the egg” question. Did she and Grace begin when Grace arrived at the car factory? In her mind, that is exactly when she first met Grace. Dani would have been in her early twenties, living a seemingly normal life in Mexico City. She lived with her father, brother, and the family dog. Grace would have been just about 30 when she came back. 

The parallels between Dani Ramos and Sarah Connor are uncanny. Both women had normal lives until terminators show up from the future to kill them. Both women are also provided with a human protector from that same future. The big difference, to Dani, was that she was not going to give birth to the leader of the Resistance. Instead, she would become the leader of that Resistance. When Grace came back and divulged that information, Dani often wondered, did it set a self-fulfilling prophecy in motion? The same can be said of Sarah in that regard. Once she became aware of her son’s importance in the future, she began to prepare for that eventuality. 

Dani had given these ideas much thought after the fight with the Rev-9 at the dam. The way Sarah’s fate coincided with hers notwithstanding, Dani considered how her fate intertwined with Grace’s. She asked the universe on multiple occasions how many times Grace had gone back to save her. How many times had they done this? Were they on an infinite loop of Dani losing Grace, saving Grace, and losing Grace again for eternity? Had it only happened once? It was a devastating story either way. 

Was it possible to change the outcome and keep Grace from dying? Could Dani do something to keep Grace at her side, whether it was in this time or the next? Dani could never understand the mind-boggling details of time travel. In the year 2020, presently, it was only an idea generated by science fiction writers. Time travel was just rumors perpetuated by the elite science community, easily dismissed by nay-sayers and mainstream media. At any rate, Dani fully understood part of the reason Sarah Connor drank as much as she did. 

Grace was another matter. If the time loop was never ending, Grace’s story became even more tragic. She grew up in the ruins after Judgement Day. She spent the first few years doing whatever she had to just to survive after her family died. From an early age, Grace knew nothing but psychological trauma and physical hardship. It did not change when she entered adulthood. She joined the Resistance and knew even greater violence and destruction on a daily basis. At least with the Resistance, Grace was given purpose and empowerment. Grace often came home from battle covered in dirt and blood. Often, it was her own blood. Dani remembered the stories Grace told her in the quiet spaces when they traveled on the train and through the desert together. She remembered feeling so sorry for Grace considering what she had gone through nearly all of her short life. Grace was never one to accept pity. She was a hard worker, loyal, gentle, and strong. Having a mission was what saved Grace’s life, and ultimately ended it, Dani realized. 

The augmentation of Grace was a tragedy in and of itself. She had been on a mission when the Commander was nearly killed by machines. Grace was ordered to help get her inside the Resistance stronghold while her fellow soldiers held off the onslaught of terminators. Dani remembered how she told her that a Rev-7, a monster with metal tentacles, had charged her in that moment. Grace had dropped flat, spun around and blew its head open; but it still managed to mortally wound her. Fellow soldiers had dragged her into the tunnel, bloody and dying, where medics found a way to patch her up. Dani believed that Grace would have probably never fought again; and the importance of protecting the commander was paramount to Grace’s existence somehow. Grace’s continued loyalty to Dani was a curse and a blessing. For one thing, she had saved Dani that day. But she had doomed herself to a short-lived existence of violence and pain. After all, Grace had volunteered for the augmentation process, which involved heavily invasive surgical procedures to replace her bones and blood with Legion machine parts. A wire mesh was implanted under her skin to protect her insides. Her eyes were probably removed to install the heads-up display tech. They fine-tuned Grace’s metabolism to assist her in fighting terminators in “short, intense bursts.” The come-down was not only unpleasant, it was deadly if untreated immediately. Had Grace lived after the dam, what would her quality of life been like? In the future, the life expectancy of an augment was only a few months, at most. Was that because of the danger imposed by fighting lethal killing machines? Or was it because of the actual augmentation? 

If the time loop was infinite, Grace would die for Dani forever. It was a notion that Dani could not reconcile nor wrap her head around. As it was, Grace had died at the dam. That was part one of this Shakespearean tragedy in three acts. They were star-crossed, like Romeo and Juliet, never meant to exist together in the same universe. Now, Dani waited for the coming of Judgement Day, trying to prepare however she and Sarah could. There was no guarantee that Dani would even survive the end of everything. However, if she did, she’d meet Grace as an adolescent. Dani remembered being at the park that afternoon, watching little Grace play. Why did she not keep an eye on her from the very beginning? Dani had to trust fate at that point, believing that what Grace told her on the plane was already set in stone. 

Dani often wondered about her relationship in the future with Grace. Although Grace had never directly told her anything, she alluded to it a couple of times. First of all, from the beginning, Grace was automatically comfortable and seemingly familiar with Dani’s body. Every time she held Dani’s hand or shielded her from danger, it required contact. To Dani that spoke louder than words. Perhaps the time Grace came from did not bother with #MeToo or asking permission for touches. Maybe physical closeness between complete strangers was acceptable, as long as you were both human. To Dani, that made sense. There was also the moment in the back of the truck, when Dani was “sleeping” in Grace’s lap. The ease at which the two women came together was probably abnormal, judging by Sarah’s silent stares. More than that was how Grace gently touched her shoulder. It wasn’t protective or necessary. It was gentle and completely gratuitous. Later, on the plane, Grace admitted to knowing Dani. But it was even deeper than that. Grace said, “yeah... I KNOW you.” It was almost like Grace was saying she knew Dani in the biblical sense. The only thing that threw Dani for a loop was when Grace said that she had raised her. That implied a more maternal relationship. Dani was confused by that. She always questioned whether or not there was more to it. There was always the possibility that with the end of civilization came the end of social norms. Maybe Dani did raise her, and when Grace grew into an adult woman, their relationship evolved into something far more intimate. It was entirely possible, and Dani was now, understandably, open to more than one interpretation of this story.

The only thing that Dani knew for sure at this point in either timeline, was that she missed Grace with all her heart. Damn right she’d save and raise her, no matter the eventual outcome. Dani had never called her own sexuality into question when Grace was concerned. Dani knew from the beginning that she could have loved Grace any way. Dani was always a firm believer in the old saying, “it’s the person you fall in love with, not the equipment they come with.” The double entendre was completely true in the case of Grace. If the time loop kept repeating forever, though certainly tragic for both women, Dani and Grace would be together endlessly. That is how Dani ultimately had to accept her fate.


End file.
